This week (and next) I am going to wrap up my Audience Connections Class by grading their papers right here plus showing my gratitude for some recent experiences. Traveling today to Syracuse for concerts though, I couldn’t resist adding to Bill’s Airport Post. I say yes, a phenomenal idea and I think we don’t have to limit it to just airports……
Aud.Connect
The Stars of the North
It’s hard to find an orchestra north of Edmonton. This is a city where around this time of year the sun seems to come up at 10 am, set by 2 pm, and never get over about 3 degrees off of the horizon. The nearest city is Calgary, some 4 hours away by car, and just try to a reasonable or convenient flight up there. But the Star of the North is the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, the small but mighty ensemble that plays 100 concerts a year for the Edmonton community. Here’s some news……………..
Introducing the Electric Celestetophone
This past weekend in the middle of conducting “The Nutcracker” a thought occurred to me. Didn’t composers try to use new instruments as soon as they became available? Case in point the Celeste. We hear Sugar Plum now and the first thought from conductors and musicians is probably Great only 10 minutes till the end of the ballet! Seriously though, when it was first heard it would have been like hearing an Electric Guitar in the orchestra today the sound was so new…
YO!!…We put the ASS in clASSical!
Time for a rant! The obsession with attracting the younger audience, making music cool and hip with hip advertising, funky clothes and punky billboards is the same as trying to sell a Yugo by putting a great stereo in it. After a while they will realize what it is and buy a bicycle and an ipod because it will go faster! Worse, it might be discrimination….
Challenge = Opportunity part 4: Turning Green into Gold!
In the Springfield Symphony there are some musicians who have tremendous initiative when it comes to community outreach and education. One of them presented a proposal to the board last season to help fund a String Trio for a trip to our sister city in Japan as part of of a cultural exchange. It was a great proposal that already had funding attached. The board approved the funding, the trip happened and it was big success. In the background from some other musicians however there were some jealous rumblings. Not anymore…….
Orchestras and the Tech Revolution
So, we’re stuck in the 19th century. You know it and I know it. Classical musicians are one of only two subspecies of Homo Sapien Sapien who still wear tailcoats. Innovations such as video screens, subtitles, mood lighting, etc., find it hard to be accepted in the concert hall. So we need new ways of taking advantage of the technology now available to us.
Challenge = Opportunity part 3: Steeling Hearts
In my first post, Out of the Shadows, I mentioned that the musicians of the Pittsburgh Symphony out of all the major orchestras I keep track of, truly demonstrate and care about the audience connection. Here are two instances of how they turned seemingly hopeless challenges into opportunities. Plus, the first in the series of “On the Go”, what people in the business are listening to right now…..
Not Sorry, Charlie……..
The question of the day – how do you satisfy an audience that ranges from 12 to 80? That is what I pondered last Thursday, 15 November, and it’s taken me this long to write about it. I’m going to tell you what happened, but I’m not going to let on how we did it until the end of the post. So there………….